


A Gift and Memories Both Bittersweet

by Angel Ascending (angel_in_ink)



Series: The Mighty Nein Go To The Beach! (Critical Role Relationship Week 2018) [3]
Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: Critical Role Relationship Week 2018, Crying, Direct Sequel To A Sweet Excursion, Hurt/Comfort, Lots of Doors In There, M/M, Someday I Will Expand On What The Inside Of Caleb's Mind Looks Like, Sunburn
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-19
Updated: 2018-06-19
Packaged: 2019-05-25 16:44:18
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,005
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14981288
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/angel_in_ink/pseuds/Angel%20Ascending
Summary: “I’m back, and I bought presents!” Molly said cheerfully as he crossed the floor of the cabana to where Caleb was laying. “Did you miss me?”“Very much,” Caleb said, sitting up with a wince and carefully setting his book aside.Caleb is sunburned and Molly comes back from shopping with both salve and an unexpected gift.





	A Gift and Memories Both Bittersweet

**Author's Note:**

  * For [CinWicked](https://archiveofourown.org/users/CinWicked/gifts).



> For the Vax to my Vex, happy birthday! You're always there for me when my brain is awful or when I need answers to questions about anything from D&D monsters to marzipan, and this fic is the least I can do to thank you. <3
> 
> This is a direct sequel to "A Sweet Excursion," so I recommend you read that before you read this.

Caleb shifted on the towel underneath him, grimacing as he turned another page in his book. It was hard to concentrate with his skin feeling so hot, just as it had been hard to sleep the night before. That was the price he had paid for going out into the sun without his layers of clothes, without even a protective layer of dirt, though he had been doing so much better with keeping clean. He had let himself be coaxed out into the bright sun and cool water with nothing on but shorts that went to his knees, and now every bit of exposed skin had gone as red as his hair.

The pain was almost worth it, if he was honest with himself. He had done a bit of swimming, had walked along the shore with Nott, who had started a collection of interesting shells, most of which were now piled near Caleb in what he thought might be an attempt to cheer him up. He had explored the rocky tide-pools with Fjord and Molly, and Fjord had identified the tiny fish and crawling things that lived there. It had been a good day and Caleb hadn’t even realized he was sunburned until he had shifted in his hammock and had gasped awake from the burning sensation that he thought had followed him out of his nightmares. He had spent the rest of the night in Fjord’s hammock instead of Molly’s, because Fjord’s skin was cooler, and Molly hadn’t faulted him in the slightest. It had helped some, and Molly had gone off with Jester hours ago (two hours and five minutes to be precise) to find something that might help Caleb even more.

“I’m back, and I bought presents!” Molly said cheerfully as he crossed the floor of the cabana to where Caleb was laying. “Did you miss me?”

“Very much,” Caleb said, sitting up with a wince and carefully setting his book aside. Molly bent down and gave Caleb a quick kiss before handing him a jar of what turned out to be a thin, almost clear salve.

“It’s the insides of some desert plant, mixed with something that should help with the pain,” Molly said, sitting behind Caleb. “Supposed to be good for burns of all sorts, so that’s handy. It’s fresh too, that’s part of what took so long. You get the front and I’ll take care of your back, okay?”

“Okay,” Caleb agreed, and gathered some of the salve onto his fingers and spread it onto the back of one arm experimentally. The relief was immediate, and he groaned because it felt so good, soothing and cool on his skin. “This is so good that it’s practically magic.”

Molly chuckled, fingers lightly rubbing salve onto the back of Caleb’s neck. “You know, I say that about certain other things that come from plants, and yet you never indulge with me. Maybe this will change your mind?”

“Still not interested,” Caleb said firmly, but not unkindly. He didn’t mind if Molly indulged in certain things, but Caleb had no interest in partaking himself. “Did you find anything exotic while you were out?”

“Not the way that you mean, but that’s all right. We got some cream that’s supposed to prevent folks from getting burnt by the sun in the first place, which I know I won’t have to tell you twice to put on before you go out in the sun again. Beau on the other hand…

“Have Jester ask her,” Caleb said.

“Good point. And I don’t know if half-elves can even get sunburned, but I got enough for Cali too.”

“Not Yasha?”

Caleb heard Molly laugh. “Surprisingly no. She’s out in all weather all the time, and I’ve never seen her once get sunburned. She doesn’t _like_ the heat, but the sun doesn’t burn her. I don’t know if that’s an aasimar thing or a barbarian thing or just a Yasha thing.”

Caleb hummed thoughtfully as he rubbed more salve on his skin, not sure himself. “Did you get anything else?”

“Well, tea, of course.” Molly yawned, and Caleb felt himself yawn in sympathy. Neither of them had slept very well last night, but at least the tea would help Molly. It would have helped Caleb as well, but the tea had the odd side effect of giving Caleb _very_ vivid dreams, while leaving the tiefling’s own sleep dreamless. “And Jester bought the bakery out of bear claws and the candy store out of marshmallows.”

“What is a marshmallow?”

“I have no idea and I haven’t tried one yet, but Jester was _very_ excited about them. They are white and squishy and knowing Jester have no redeeming nutritional value. She also bought chocolates and caramels and taffy. I _may_ have bought ten pounds of fudge. It’s in Jester’s magic bag so it doesn’t melt.”

Caleb groaned. “Jester is the worst influence on you.”

“You won’t be saying that once you try this fudge, it’s so good! Granted, I’ve never had fudge before and I have nothing to compare it to, but Jester agreed with me.”

Caleb chuckled at Molly’s enthusiasm. “I will give it a try, but I am not the biggest fan of chocolate.” He finished rubbing salve into the last sunburnt bit of himself and turned so he was facing Molly.

“Well thankfully I was just finished with your back,” Molly said before Caleb cut him off with a kiss.

“Thank you,” Caleb said several moments later once the kiss was finished. “I feel a lot better.”

“I can tell,” Molly said with a grin, reaching up to cup Caleb’s cheek.

Caleb leaned into the touch like a cat. “I could take a nap, probably,” he said with a sigh and another yawn.

“I could join you,” Molly said, echoing the yawn back. “Oh, but before you do, I did get you something at the candy store. Well, I didn’t pick it out, technically, one of the confectioners was quite insistent I give these to you, once she learned you were Zemnian like her. She refused to take payment for them, which only meant I tipped her generously enough so it hopefully evened out. ”

Caleb blinked in surprise. “Zemnian?”

“A Zemnian tiefling, of all things. Rose colored skin, pink hair, told me her name was Rache.”

“Can’t say I know her,” Caleb said thoughtfully. Tieflings were a rare sight, the closer to Rexxentrum one got, and he had never seen one growing up. “Rache” meant revenge in Zemnian, and Caleb wondered if there was a story there. “What did she give you?”

Molly reached for a plain white box tied in gold ribbon that had been set beside his other purchases, handing it to Caleb. “Something called marzipan? She said the shape was traditional, even though it was the wrong time of year for it, not that I would know the difference. Still, they looked cute.”

Caleb knew what he would find almost before he undid the ribbon and lifted the lid, and he prided himself on his hands only shaking a little as he looked down at the box’s contents. Eight small but chubby marzipan pigs stared up at him, pink and perfect.

“Oh,” Caleb heard himself whisper as he plucked a pig from the box and handed it to Molly before taking one for himself, popping his into his mouth without hesitation, as if he were an impatient child again.

“Seems almost a shame to eat it,” Molly said as he partook of his.

Caleb barely heard Molly. Smell was one of the keys to memory, it was said, but so was taste. The marzipan was sweet and smooth, the taste of sugar and almonds on his tongue flooding his mind and he was a child sitting at the small wooden table with his parents and it was the new year and they were eating together and everything was perfect and then he was standing outside the house and there was fire and smoke and screaming—

“Caleb?” Molly’s voice was quiet, his eyes full of concern. “Caleb are you all right? You look like you’re about to smile and cry all at once.”

Caleb remembered everything, it was his blessing and his curse, but in the time he had been alive he had learned to only _recall_ what he wanted to and compartmentalize the rest, for the most part. It was something he had _had_ to learn, lest all the memories consume him alive, paralyze him with their constant repetition. So he shoved the memories of the fire behind a door in his mind (a door that constantly smoldered, smoke drifting out from underneath) and focused instead on the memories behind another door, the same door as the other, uncharred and whole.

“My mother, she…” Caleb swallowed, the taste of almonds lingering on his tongue. “She’d save up what little money we had so that we’d have the almonds for marzipan, come the new year. It was a special treat, you see. I remember sitting at the kitchen table with her, helping knead the paste and shape it into pigs. Pigs are lucky, because if you’re a farmer, well, that’s what luck looks like, fat pigs ready for market. My marzipan pigs never looked lucky,” Caleb said with a chuckle that felt thick in his throat. “My mind was clever, but my hands, well, they were rather clumsy.” He looked down at his shaking hands, red from sunburn. “If you knead the marzipan too much, the texture is just terrible. Too little and it’s grainy. I was rather impatient, and always managed to underwork the portion my mother gave to me. But hers, her pigs were perfect nearly every time. Just like these.”

“So it was a good gift then,” Molly said, relief flooding his face.

“ _Ja_ , it was a very good gift. It—“ the word was cut off as the first ugly sob wrenched its way out of his throat. It was followed by another, and another, and the next thing he knew he was leaning against Molly’s shoulder, crying as if his heart was breaking, as if there was anything left to break. Molly held him gently, humming softly.

“It’s all right, love, I’m here,” Molly said softly. “You cry all you like.”

Caleb didn’t deserve Molly’s softness, but he took it anyway, because he was a selfish man sometimes. Molly didn’t know what Nott and Beau knew, about how awful Caleb was, about how his parents had died. His parents were gone, that was all the rest of them knew. If Caleb got his way, one day his parents wouldn’t be gone, that mistake would be unmade. But there was a complication now that there hadn’t been before, another family to protect, relationships he didn’t want to unravel. Could he have both? His mother and father _and_ his friends and lovers? Could he unmake one mistake without making another? In trying to have everything, would he end up with nothing?

There were no answers in the eyes of the marzipan pigs, still nestled in their box, resting on Molly’s lap. When Caleb looked up into Molly’s eyes, there were no answers there either, but he hadn’t expected there to be.

“Better now?” Molly asked, and Caleb nodded. It wasn’t a lie. It had been a much needed cry, cathartic, bitter and sweet all at once.

“I’d like to share the rest of these with the others later, if that’s all right,” Caleb asked softly.

“They’re yours to do with as you like,” Molly said. “I think it’s a grand idea, personally. I’ve heard if you hoard luck it’ll be sure to sour, but if you give it away it’ll come back to you a hundredfold.”

“I don’t know about that,” Caleb said. “But everyone could use a bit of luck, and something sweet.” And if that luck came back to him, on that day in the future when he might have to make a bitter choice? Well, he wouldn’t say no.

**Author's Note:**

> All I know about marzipan I learned from Google, Wikipedia, my braintwin, and my limited personal experience, so apologies if I messed anything up.
> 
> I'm angel-ascending over on Tumblr if y'all want to stop by and say hi!


End file.
